The Great Carsoni

In an age of segmentation, late-night television remains one of America's few shared cultural experiences, and it all began with Johnny Carson | Gene Edward Veith

Johnny Carson dominated late-night television for an astonishing 30 years, from 1962 to 1992. In that span, LBJ, the '60s, Watergate, the Reagan years, and the pre-presidential Clinton were fodder for his good-natured satire. On Jan. 23, Mr. Carson died of emphysema at the age of 79. But late-night television still follows the format he perfected. And as late-night TV has become one of the nation's few unifying cultural experiences—and the prime source of political information for nearly a fourth of young adults—Mr. Carson's cultural influence lives on.

John William Carson was born on Oct. 23, 1925, in Corning, Iowa, and his family moved to Norfolk, Neb., when he was 8. When he was 12 years old, he sent off for a mail-order magic kit and started performing at the local Rotary Club and at church socials, calling himself "the Great Carsoni." Young Johnny would also spend hours listening to Jack Benny on the radio, whose droll humor, sense of timing, and comical reactions would become the model for his own comic style.